Welcome to a new feature on the
blog: Short Story Time. Back in 2018, leading up to the publication of my then-upcoming
thriller Oblique, penned under the
pseudonym Neal Vandar (an anagram of Alan Draven), I had decided to republish
all my short stories for free as well as a couple of my novellas. The links to
those tales have long disappeared so I figured it was time to bring them back
and introduce them to new readers. Starting today, I’ll upload one of my short
stories or novellas on the first Saturday of every month as a free PDF. It will
lead to the publication of the collected Amok tales as a print/Kindle book
around November or December 2024.
To get the ball rolling, since we’re in the middle of baseball season, why not start with the only short story I wrote as Neal Vandar back in 2018 titled “Scapegoat.” It’s a baseball tale but I promise you, even if you don’t care for baseball, you’re bound to get a kick out of it. It’s a fantasy tale that deals with the Curse of the Cubs, the love of baseball, some time travel, and a whole lot of nostalgia. It’s 26 pages long so you can read it in one sitting. You can download it right here. If you enjoy this tale, drop me a line here or on Twitter to let me know; I always love to hear from my readers. You can come back here on August 5th for another free story. Happy reading!
